


Clavum Nitorem.

by eikvaren



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 2011!phan, Anxiety, Gender Roles, Heteronormativity, M/M, Nail Polish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 08:06:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15577497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eikvaren/pseuds/eikvaren
Summary: It's July, 2011, and Dan wants to try wearing nail polish.





	Clavum Nitorem.

 

 

 

 

 

 

_"I celebrate myself, and sing myself,_

 

 

 

 

 

 

_And what I assume you shall assume,_

_For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you._

_I loafe and invite my soul,_

_I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass._

_My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,_

_Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents the same,_

_I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,_

_Hoping to cease not till death."_

_Walt Whitman. i._

_\---_

It's a wet-hot afternoon, midway through July. The streets of Manchester smell of sweaty businessmen and the ever-present smog he's grown used to. Dan is gone off walking to Boots to buy hair-dye for Phil.

He'd only really been out for Tesco—to get milk for the flat—but halfway past Phil had texted, telling him that his hair-dye's near to running out and if Dan could pick some up at the nearest shop.

A two-mile detour's lead him through the summer heat, sun beaming down to his skin and his shirt soaking through with a familiar pre-condensed sweat. The traffic is nearing past rush-hour, ambulances and speeding vehicles drowning out his every thought until his conscious is nothing but an overheated blur.

Entering the shop, the cooler air runs a chill over him.

Dan heads to the hair-dye selection, reading over the various brands and colour types until he finds one he thinks he's seen in Phil's bathroom.

Just as he's walking towards the front register to pay, he sees a makeup isle at the corner of his eye, stocked with colours and shades of eye palettes, lipstick, and nail paint; and he can't find it inside himself to resist the urge to have a quick glance through.

It's the nail polish that catches his first attention. Every colour imaginable, every palette of warm yellows, to navy blue, to matte grey or rainbow mixed in with white glitter.

He appears to have stared just a moment too long, as soon enough a sales lady is tapping his shoulder and asking if he needs help finding something for his girlfriend.

Dan's face goes warm. He takes a step backwards from the line of nail polish. "No—uh, I'm fine. Just looking around. Thank you. Thanks."

"Alright. Just let me know if you need anything else, love." She says, before walking off to another corner of the store, sweet smile still plastered across her face.

*

It's been just past a week since that day in Boots, and Dan still hasn't managed to forget the lines of colour he's seen.

Everywhere, now—the delivery person for Phil's groceries, and her velvet red polish. A woman at the city centre juggling three young children and bags of clothing, a shiny coating of some shade of purple to go with her suited jeans on a manicure. Phil Skyping with Paperlilies, and him instinctively glancing at a light layer of clear blue moving across the screen.

A week later, and Phil's gone out to the shops for the day, and he's left alone at the flat, spread out on a duvet.

He doesn't know what he wants.

When he was much younger—sixteen at the most—Dan remembers that he had taken his mum's black eyeliner and nail polish. Had taken them into his room, and tried to play a pseudo Gerard Way.

It hadn't gone over well. His dad had walked in on him, and the eyeliner smudged wrong, and the nail paint ran all over his fingers until it looked like he had rubbed himself in dirty coal or baking. His dad certainly hadn't understood why he'd want to wear makeup made for a woman, even if it was only for a chance at looking like a 'true emo'.

But now he's here, and he's alone, and he could go out to the shops and buy anything—made for men or for women.

He frowns to himself.

**

Half past an hour later, Dan is back in a nearby Boots, pretending to look over the sweets section.

He's been trying to pluck up the courage to go back to that makeup section, choose a pretty bottle of nail polish, and checkout without anyone even questioning him on why.

Taking a deep breath—this shouldn't be so hard—he steps back into the isle.

No one notices to care.

He goes over to the rows of colours he's thought of, glancing quickly, heart racing to impossible speeds. His mind is too panicked with itself to properly think the decision through, so he decides to go to his favourite colour, a nice gold tone.

Heading back up to the front, Dan grabs a birthday card from the stock, hoping he'll be taken as a nice early gift for his girlfriend.

"That'll be five-pound ninety." A disinterested teenage boy working by the till replies.

"Uh—" Anxiety flares back into his chest. "Here you—here you go. Keep the change, okay. Thank you." He passes a ten-pound note, not bothering to count it out. Wanting to leave here as quickly as possible.

"Want a bag with that?"

"Yes. Thanks."

"Here you go, sir. Have a nice day." His voice is blank with emotion, but Dan still feels like he's seen right through him.

*

Back in the safety of home, sitting on Phil's bed, Dan can finally read over the bottle's label.

The brand is called 'Molten Metal Nail Paint', created by someone called 'Barry M'. He likes the colour, though. Thinks it might suit him against his tanned skin.

After laying an old towel over the bedsheets, Dan opens the nail polish.

A few odd drops from the brush fall to his jeans, and they'll properly stain, so he should've thought this through a second longer.

He goes for the thumb of his right hand, one stroke across the nail. It stains against part of Dan's skin, but overall he seems to have done it fairly enough.

The second, the third, and the fourth play out just the same—as he falls further into his world of uninterrupted concentration—although he manages to fuck over with his pinky just a bit.

It's time for his wrong hand, and he freezes with the brush midair for a moment. Dan examines the right hand, pulling it away from himself and spreading his fingers carefully. He thinks it's a nice job, if only a bit messy, and the colour suits him well enough. He moves his hand closer again, frowning lightly, biting his lip.

He's just about shakily starting on the second finger of his left hand when the door to the bedroom clicks open.

Phil's standing in the passway, jacket halfway to being taken off, concerned look. "I've been looking for you? Why haven't you answered—"

In the same instance of a moment that Phil registers what Dan's been doing, Dan notices Phil's presence and moves to hide the bottle of nail paint behind his back.

There's a stilted silence before Phil's confused, asking him, "What are you doing?"

He says nothing, heartbeat intense and staring in silence.

"Are you... painting your nails?"

"Uh—yeah."

"Isn't that kind of a girls thing?"

"I guess." He looks down at his half-done hand. It looks like shit. The room smells of chemicals and his ears are ringing.

"Okay." Says Phil.

He can already feel that his face is hot and red, that his chest feels like it's been held by an imaginary force that's pressing all of his body together painfully. It's not so often that he wants to hide away from Phil.

"Well, I brought pizza for dinner. Okay?"

"Okay."

Dan spends the next twenty minutes scrubbing off the polish into the bathroom sink.

***

It's seven years later, and they're staying in a hotel room in Dublin.

Dan's been sitting on their bed for the better part of the hour, applying and reapplying matte black nail polish that he'd brought from the shops earlier in the week.

He wants this time to be perfect. He's bought a nail kit; shaped them to be a nicer, clean shape; he's even bought glossy overcoat to make them look a bit neater to touch-up afterwards.

His right hand's turned out good—only a few easily fixable bits here and there. But he's always had trouble with his left, wrong handedness fucking him over at the end of it all.

"Phil?"

Phil, from somewhere off in the bathroom, calls back: "Yeah?"

"Can you help with painting my left hand?"

"Sure, I could try."

"Thanks. I'm fine with my right, but I always mess up with my left and I need it to be perfect."

"I've heard," Phil says, entering the room with a towel around his waist and over his shoulders. "I need a minute to get dressed though."

"'Kay." He shifts slightly on the bed. "Anyway, I wish I was fucking ambidextrous, or something. This is shit. How do other people do this? Is it like—does everyone secretly get a manicure once a month and leave me to believe that they just naturally have perfectly done nails on the first go?"

"I'm sure the entire world is against you on this, Dan. Out to get you and your perfect nail dreams."

"Pfft, clearly."

A few minutes later, Phil is dressed and sitting across from Dan on the bed, left hand in his own. "I'll try to be careful with it."

"Better, mate. If this doesn't work out I'm giving up."

"Tsk. I swear you use up whole bottles of nail polish without ever having it on for more than an hour."

"Well, it needs to be perfect."

"It doesn't really, though. Have you ever looked closely at someone who wear's it hands? They're probably all messed up too." He lightly strokes across Dan's thumb. "My mum's done it for forty years now, and she still has dry marks all the way to her wrist, she says."

"Does she really, or are you making that up for me?"

"We may never know." Phil's tongue is sticking out in a slight concentration, shaking hand steadying Dan's. "I think I did okay on this one."

"Oi, there's a bit off to the side."

"Scrub it off later?"

"Maybe."

"Clearly I was born to be a nail polish applier, right? Maybe that's my calling in life. Quit YouTube and become a professional."

"Absolutely. You'll be getting calls from all the big celebrities in no time."

"Meet your faves."

"Let's not get too cheeky, alright. C-level artists."

"Mmmm. This okay?"

Dan's hand is still a tad messy, painted in black marks and parts of his nails aren't quite fully covered.

"S'good, yeah."

**Author's Note:**

> nail polish referenced: https://www.boots.com/barry-m-molten-metal-nail-paint-10214682
> 
> im still writing at 6am on -2 hours of sleep and no beta so like,,,, idk beware spelling shit lol
> 
> tumblr is @phansb


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